


can’t lose what you’ve never had

by nightskywithrainbows



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Angst, Azula is a psychopath, Canon Compliant, How Do I Tag, Kinda, Sad Ending, She just wants to burn the world ok, The Last Agni Kai (Avatar), Unrequited Love, azula has mommy issues, she is not ok
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:06:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,350
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26478430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightskywithrainbows/pseuds/nightskywithrainbows
Summary: Love is for the others, love isn’t for the leaders that mother can’t bring herself to hug.And when I break, I welcome it.I will lash out with my lightning, and let it burn you to a crisp, burn the world to a crisp with me in it.Because she is gone, and I can’t blame her, and you can’t lose love you never had.(This is rated teen and up only because of azula’s mental state in this. It’s pretty dark)
Relationships: Azula/Ty Lee (Avatar)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 21





	can’t lose what you’ve never had

**Author's Note:**

> This is an Azula- centric fic, covering scenes from childhood, references to the boiling rock episode, the beach episode, and the final episode (sozin’s comet). Mostly canon, slightly OOC Azula. Any recognizable lines are taken from the show. I don’t own anything other than my own words, nor do i make any money off this. 
> 
> I also haven’t watched the show in a while and only did very minor research, so please excuse any inconsistencies.
> 
> This was actually one of my favorites to write. I hope you enjoy, and please leave a comment or kudos ;)
> 
> JJ

_________Part 1: Childhood__________

“Catch me if you can!”

Mai glides, her long black hair, up in a high ponytail, singing through the air. Ty Lee skips, exuberance in her step and on her expressive face. Who to chase, who to follow? Flowing like a river, lines of black painted against a horizon that isn’t quite there, or binds of chocolate brown whipping across my sight as Ty Lee somersaults across the grass. Who to chase, who to pursue, who to follow when Daddy isn’t here to call me a leader?

She’s flighty, my Ty Lee, flighty and flexible and fluttering across my heart. 

It’s so difficult, that millisecond of indecision that spans a thousand agonizing lifetimes. But it’s over, and I’m reaching, following, my hand wrapped around her braid.

She turns effortlessly, with a smile on her face. 

I push her to the ground. Can’t you see, lovely, can’t you see, that I don’t know what to do with these feelings that are banned, that cannot be spoken, and aggression is all I know.

Don’t think I don’t know, Ty Lee, I know because you whispered it to me when you thought I wasn’t listening. 

Of course I was listening. I was listening as I listen to father’s rants and mother’s talks behind stone pillars. I listened, and I heard, your neglect and dismission, and I wanted to rend their heads from their necks and their hearts from their chests, as they did to you with the absence of words and praise and hugs.

I don’t know how else to show that I see you, I notice you, I noticed you so brightly. All I can show is the blessing of my leadership (isn’t that what you want Daddy?) and the comfort of my shove and my mocking laughter. 

Still you follow, still I follow, still we lead and follow and run in tandem. 

Together we run, and trick, and tease, little Zuzu with his mother and his crown and his love I don’t know how to feel.

“You’re so cute together!” Cries Ty Lee, her face showing expressions foreign and words unsaid, emotions unfelt.

Is it so bad to want that? I know, it’s horrible. Me, Azula, wanting something. I was born lucky, I was born talented, I was born _better._ I was born if not loved then feared, then glanced at with the expression that says all I can never have. It says “I don’t quite know what to make of this child, this child with a glinting silver blade instead of a heart, this child that is the only one I can’t hug.”

I don’t quite know what to make of myself either. 

But around Ty Lee that fades, and my awkwardness and calculating eyes and cruel voice and unlovable arms becomes alright, and my hair without a strand out of place becomes undone.

I become undone. But that’s alright, because she’s there, and she’s the only thing that makes me feel that way, and since I can’t desire then I crave, I crave what I shouldn’t and I can’t but I do anyway.

Love, the dreaded word never said in the imposing walls of my father’s palace. 

Love is whispered in my mother’s arms, is whispered in her words of wisdom, is whispered in the concern in her eyes. Love is shown in her similarities to me, calculating and ruthless but for such different reasons. Love is shown from mothers to darling sons (not monster daughters).

Love is shown between the gardener and the maid, who steal a quick kiss when they can (not power hungry princesses).

Love is shown in the greetings between friends in our academy (not those who rule by fear).

I can’t show love, he would be disappointed, and yet I still think, in the darkest deepest depths of my soul, that I would give anything for love to be whispered to me, whispered by her.

____________Part 2: Breakdown___________

I am no longer a child, but I am still unworthy of her love. 

I am a soldier and a terror and a cruel, cruel leader when all I want to do is be held by her. 

It was her betrayal that broke me. I suppose I can’t really call it that, since I’m the one who gave her a reason, I’m the one who deserved it, I’m the one who miscalculated. 

I never thought it could happen. Oh I expected it, I did, but after all this time of proving I don’t need the weakness you call love, I forgot. I forgot that Ty Lee is the only, the only one that has ever, ever made me feel that way. The only one that makes everything fade away, and around her I can forget the rest and she’s all that matters. 

I couldn’t show it, of course, but what matters is that I felt it and I didn’t do anything. I didn’t expect to be able to, and still it hurts. It aches in that part of me I ignore, that part of me that remains untouched after training and battle color my body with a rainbow of purple, bruises and burns felt deep in my bones. 

It aches deep within me, and if I could, I would sob and break and finally, mercifully shatter. 

I find that I can. 

It’s her fault of course, Ursa with her regretful expression I would burn from her skull if I could. Confused, she says, and I would never admit that she’s right, because I must be a leader and if they don’t fear me- no, they do fear me, they will fear me, they all fear me. 

Is that why you’re gone, Ty Lee?

And she has the nerve to look at me, finally in the eyes like she never could when I was a child, and say “I love you, Azula.”

I can’t breathe or think or feel in this whirlwind, this tornado filled with glass shards as I burn. I will break you, and her, and everyone who thinks they can look at me with anything in their eyes but fear. 

I don’t care that it will break me farther. I welcome it. 

I revel in the pain, and I look at Zuzu with his mother and his crown and his love I don’t know how to feel- no, no, he has none of that anymore, I’ve taken it all away, and yet the water peasant with the gentle blue eyes and the face that says _mother_ looks at me with steady anger (so like Mother). 

And it breaks me farther. 

Good. 

I will lash out with my lightning, and let it burn you to a crisp, burn the world to a crisp with me in it. 

Zuko and his flames that speak of yellow warmth (not blue pain) can’t touch me. 

Yet touch me they do, and they slam me on my back (harder, I deserve it) and he looks at me with defiance. Soft Zuko, baby Zuzu looks at me with his ruined face and I can’t help but think “sorry.”

And it’s not enough, it will never be enough, but I can’t bring myself to hurt him one more time. 

So instead, a crackling spear of white blue pain streaks to the water tribe girl, and it-

Hits him. It hits Zuzu, and all I can do is laugh because it’s gone, it’s gone, my one last tether, it’s gone and now I can finally break and be ground into dust by this freedom. 

Of course, I don’t stop. I keep shooting and aiming and fighting and leading, and words are coming out of my mouth and I shoot white blue pain at water tribe girl, and as she wins I’m grateful.

I think _drown me, kill me, you’re so close, drown me where there is no fire, no lightning, no white hot pain, only oblivion._

She binds me instead. 

It’s worse. 

And I continue to exist as a shattered broken vessel of lost love and lost crowns and lost happiness, but you can’t lose what you’ve never had.


End file.
